Guide to Atmospherics
Atmospherics is responsible for maintaining breathable atmosphere on the station. To do this, it is equipped with variety of pumps, gas mixers and other machinery. The atmospheric simulation is fairly complex, and allows you to make various modifications and changes to optimize it to your liking. This guide will cover the basics. Disposals machinery, while also under jurisdiction of Atmospherics, is covered in separate guide: Guide to Disposals Atmospherics This is current layout of Atmospherics. Atmospherics can be divided into three "sections". The main section, where most of the pipes are, is where you will be working most of the time. The high pressure storage rooms, located north and south from main section, isolated by space, store various gases that may be manipulated. To the north-east you can find small shared control room with various consoles that can be used to remotely monitor atmosphere related machinery. The atmospherics is already operational from round start, however it is very far from optimal. Even two minutes of attention can considerably increase it's performance, simply by changing configuration of few machines. Go to the "Basic Setup" section to learn about this. Theory This section will provide various information on how the atmospheric system works. Gases Before we begin working with the machines, we should know what gases exist in the game. Oxygen (O2) Station's atmosphere contains approximately 21% of this gas, and it is required for survival of people on the station. Should oxygen drop below 16 kPa suffocation damage will begin, eventually killing you. This gas is also flammable, when combined with fuel (such as gaseous Phoron or spilled welding fuel). Nitrogen (N2) Station's atmosphere contains approximately 79% of this gas. Pure oxygen atmosphere would be a high fire risk, and only 21 kilopascals of pressure would be insufficient and uncomfortable (possibly even causing brute injury due to low pressure). In order to prevent that, nitrogen is mixed with oxygen. This air mix is then provided to the distribution loop, pressurising most rooms to approximately 101 kilopascals. It is also most common coolant choice for the Supermatter Engine. Carbon Dioxide (CO2) "Waste" gas produced by most organic beings, and sometimes (depending on used coolant) by the Engine. It can be found in trace amounts in station's atmosphere. Scrubbers are automatically configured to filter this gas out into the waste loop. CO2 becomes increasingly dangerous as it's amount increases. Increased amounts of CO2 will cause you to feel short of breath, while also causing minor suffocation damage. Very large amounts of CO2 will knock you out and kill you after some time. It is sometimes used as coolant for the Supermatter Engine due to it's larger thermal capacity. Fires of any kind also produce considerable amount of this gas. Nitrous Oxide (N2O) A relatively dangerous gas. Small concentrations cause giggling, while larger concentrations will knock you out completely and very quickly. It is used in Medbay's anesthetic internals as sedative for patients undergoing surgery. Keep in mind that if you are refilling these internals for medbay, it has to be mixed with oxygen otherwise it will suffocate the patient! Phoron (PH) A very dangerous gas when used improperly, and very useful gas if used correctly. Phoron is highly toxic to organic life. Furthermore, when combined with enough oxygen, it becomes incredibly flammable. It is commonly used in the Toxins laboratory to create explosives. Some engineers also prefer it as coolant for the Supermatter Engine as it transfers heat considerably better than any other gas. Machinery This section will cover the most commonly used components. These components may be obtained from the Pipe Dispenser. They can be secured in place with wrench. Some components require an existing pipe to connect to, while some components can be wrenched down alone. To unsecure the component, wrench may be used again. Electronic components, like pumps, have to be turned off first. Some other components, like pipes, can not be unsecured if pressure inside the pipe is too large (approximately 303kPa or larger). Keep in mind that unsecuring a pipe segment may cause part of it's contents to leak into local atmosphere. This may be potentionally dangerous if the pipe contained phoron or other dangerous gas. Pipes The most common component. Pipes serve as interconnection between other machines, such as vents, pumps, scrubbers, and more. Three variants of pipes exist - "Regular" pipes which are primarily used in Atmospherics, and their Scrubber and Supply variants. These variants are offset and can overlap on the same tile, without being actually connected, allowing you to run multiple pipes in parallel. Another special category are Heat Exchange pipes , which allow for heat transfer between the gas inside the pipe, and in the local atmosphere. These are sometimes used for industrial cooling, for example to radiate excess heat from the Supermatter Engine into space. To radiate heat into space the gas has to be relatively hot, otherwise the process will be very slow. It can be sped up by increasing pressure in the pipe, for example by adding more gas. Pumps Pumps are used to move gas from one pipe to another one. They use energy from local APC to do so. Power usage increases as gas pressure difference grows. Regular pumps are capped at 7500 Watts, High Power variants at 15000 Watts. The pump can't use more energy than this. If pressure difference is too high for the pump to handle the flow rate will drop, slowing it down. Pumps have simple UI that can be opened by clicking the pump with empty hand. This UI allows you to change desired output pressure, and to turn the pump on or off. Valve Manual valve, and it's digital counterpart can be used to connect or disconnect two pipes with ease. It can be toggled by clicking it with empty hand. The digital version can be controlled by synthetics, such as the AI. Pressure Regulator Pressure regulators are somewhere between pumps and valves. They act as a one-way valve, letting gas from one pipe flow to the other one. Regulator however lacks power of pump, which means it can't overcome any pressure difference. Gas will only flow if the output pipe has lower pressure than the input one. It has a simple UI that can be accessed by clicking it with an empty hand. This UI allows you to open or close the valve, which is basically an on/off switch for the regulator. You can also set desired pressure and flow rate, and set the mode. Desired pressure is only taken into account when "Input" or "Output" mode is selected. If Input mode is selected, the pressure regulator will act as "pressure relief" valve, that will let gas through when input pipe's pressure raises above the configured value. If Output mode is selected the pressure regulator will act similarly to pumps, letting gas through as long as output's pressure is below target pressure. Pressure regulators are fairly complex to understand, but when used properly allow for very high flexibility. Vent Vents act as pumps which, instead of moving gas to another pipe, move the gas into local atmosphere. Large amounts of these can be found around the station, connected to the distribution loop. They refill air in any room that loses pressure. Scrubber Similar to vents, the scrubber is basically an inverted vent that drains air into itself, and moves it to the connected pipe. However, scrubbers have an extra functionality. They can be configured via an Air Alarm to filter certain specific gases. When set up like this, only filtered gases will be moved to the pipe, everything else will be returned to local atmosphere. These are commonly found around the station as are Vents. They are normally set to scrub Carbon Dioxide, which is produced by breathing, but may be set to scrub any gas via the Air Alarm. Omni Gas Filter Omni Gas Filters can have up to four pipes attached (one in each direction). They have a UI that can be accessed by clicking the filter. To enter configuration mode click the Configure button, once finished click it again to save the changes. Keep in mind that it won't be able to turn the filter on while it is in configuration mode. Configuration allows you to say which side will be the input, which one will be the output, and what gases will be filtered into remaining side(s). While operational, the filter takes gas from input pipe, fully filters the gases it's configured to filter out into respective pipe(s), and pushes the remaining gas into the output pipe. Omni Gas Mixer Omni Gas Mixer is highly similar to Omni Gas Filter mentioned above. The only difference is that instead of filtering gases, it mixes them, in a configured ratio. This ratio, as well as input/output sides can be configured via the UI that can be opened by clicking it with an empty hand. Other Freezers and Heaters can be connected to a pipe to cool or heat the gas in it. Meter can be connected to a pipe to display the pressure and temperature in this pipe. It won't display precise gas composition, however. Operations This section will cover basic setup procedure, and common upgrades that may be made. Basic Setup While Atmospherics is operational from round start, these quick steps will allow you to considerably increase it's performance within very short time. It is not necessary to make any pipe modifications - all changes will be in configuration, which means this can also be done by the AI. It is suggested to have the Atmospherics layout image opened in other tab/screen, this section will reference it a lot. Pumps There are four pumps that are by default set to 101 kPa. This is very low number, which means the pump don't use their full potential. These pumps are located near the pipe dispensers, and are labeled "Waste In Pump" "Distro Pump" and "Port Pumps" on the overview image. Waste In Pump takes gas from waste pipeline, and pushes it further to waste filters. Set this pump to 15 000kPa (MAX setting) Distro Pump takes gas from air mixing system in atmospherics, and pushes it to station's distribution systems. Depressurised rooms are refilled by vents from this pipeline. Generally accepted value to set this pump to is 315 kilopascals. It can be easily dropped to make modifications, while boosting performance of vents, espicially if more vents work at the same time. Port Pumps are similar to above, except that they only connect to connector ports at engineering lobby. These connector ports house portable air pumps and scrubbers. Both of these pumps should be set to 15 000kPa (MAX setting) Tank Control Computers Gas tank control computers may be clicked at to bring up a simple UI. Few quick changes done on each of these tanks can help increase the speed of waste filtering. Do this for all consoles labeled "Tank Control" on the overview image. First, open the console's UI by clicking it. If you see an "ERROR: Can not find input port" message, click the Search button next to it. That should resolve the problem. If it does not work, there may be some physical damage. Now locate entries "Flow Rate Limit" and "Max Output Pressure Set". Use the right-most "+" symbol to increase these values to maximal possible number. For flow rate this will be 700l/s, for output pressure approximately 5066kPa. Confirm the changes by pressing "Set Flow Rate" and "Set Pressure" buttons. Common Upgrades Keep in mind that Atmospherics is a highly complex system. There is no "Best" way on how to set it up. Each Atmospheric Technician will probably have their preference on what changes are to be made. While atmospherics can be upgraded considerably, larger changes are quite time consuming and may not be optimal for everyone. This section already assumes you have at least basic atmospherics knowledge, and serves mostly as an inspiration for things you can do. Pump Swapping As outlined above, there are two variants of pumps available. Regular ones - which are also installed in atmospherics - and High Power variants that have double power rating. If you see a pump that often runs on it's full power rating, it is usually worthwhile to replace it with a high power variant. High power pumps have no drawbacks, so feel free to replace all pumps with these. Freezer/Heater setup Atmospherics has, by default, one freezer and heater. These are often unused, except for special circumstances. You can connect these to the waste line instead. That will allow you to heat or cool the waste. Sometimes very hot gas can enter the waste line - either due to a fire, or due to Toxins Laboratory dumping unused gas from burn chamber there. Freezer can help you cool down the waste to more acceptable temperatures. Ideal temperature for atmospherics is around 20°C. Dual Filters It is possible to install second (or even third, if you are feeling like experimenting!) set of filters next to the first one. That theoretically doubles the filtering rate. Make sure you configure and connect the filters correctly. Waste Support Pumps Gas storage tanks store gases under very high pressure. Gas injectors that are used to inject filtered waste into respective tanks are very slow. You can speed this up a bit by adding a high powered pump to each storage tank's input (green pipe). Good place to do it is right by the window in space. Antagonist Possibilities Atmospherics is extremely powerful tool in hands of antagonists. This is not reserved to "Pipe phoron into distribution and laugh as station burns down", in fact, if this is done without proper reason it is likely to lead to antagonist jobban, if not worse. This section will provide basic information on what antagonists can do with atmospherics. DISCLAIMER WARNING. These tips are generally reserved only for antagonists. Doing these things as non-antagonist is very likely to lead to staff intervention. Read the rules before proceeding! Even as antagonist, before you take actions that impact majority of people in round (like above mentioned "Phoron in Distribution"), adminhelp first to get a green light! Custom Gas Mixes You can use gas mixers to create gas mixture that suits your preference. Do you want to torture someone? Create a Phoron + CO2 mixture, and use it as source for your victim's internals. Keep in mind that this will kill your victim very quickly, so it's suggested to use it only for short time. Another possibility may be O2-N2O knockout mixture that, while not causing any harm, will knock out whoever breathes it. If you aim to capture someone, replacing their internals with this may provide useful. Threats You don't have to be an atmospheric technician to use atmospherics to your advantage as an antagonist! Station is likely to listen to your demands when you threaten the station with a bomb cleverly placed next to the precious air supply. HE Torture Chamber You can buckle your handcuffed victim to a heat exchanging pipe segment. You can then heat or cool the gas inside that pipe accordingly. High enough temperatures will cause serious burns to whoever is buckled to the pipe. Endless Possibilities As already mentioned multiple times, atmospherics system is very versatile and can be modified in many ways to suit your liking. Use this to your advantage, but keep in mind what was said in the disclaimer above - when in doubt, adminhelp first! Atmospherics, Guide to